Ireland's major contribution to 20th-century
music has been in the field of folk and popular music rather
than classical; her folk-songs are heard world wide, and the
more recent fusion of Celtic music with rock music has been
a major international influence. Any assessment of Ireland's
20th-century classical music is further complicated by Ireland's
political history.

Irish classical music was founded on the achievement
of John Field (1782-1837) in piano music, and the opera singer
and composer John Balfe (1808-1870). However, two major British
figures of the late 19th and early 20th century were actually
Irish, Charles Stanford (1852-1924) and Hamilton Harty
(1879-1941), both of whom wrote in a late-Romantic idiom. Both
were sufficiently aware of their native roots to include Irish
elements in their music, and properly belong to any history
of Irish music. It should also be noted that Irish influences
are to be found in the works of a number of English composers
of the same period, notably Arnold Bax (1883-1953), who
actually wrote Irish nationalist novels under an assumed Irish
name.

The composers following this generation, who
have worked exclusively in the context of an independent Eire,
are virtually unknown outside Ireland. Frederick May (born 1911),
who studied in Vienna but whose compositions were curtailed
by the onset of deafness, is best known for his articulate String
Quartet in C (1936), and Brian Boydell (born 1917), active
as a teacher and promoter of new music, for his own string quartets.
Gerard Victory (born 1921) and John Kinsella (born 1932) both
adopted 12-tone techniques; the former is known for his radio
and television work, and his output includes Jonathan Swift
- a symphonic portrait, a descriptive tone-poem following
the life of the Irish satirist. Seán O'Riada (born 1931),
musical director of the Abbey Theatre from 1955 to 1962, has
been eclectic in his styles, ranging from 12-tone elements to
suggestions of folk-song, and is known for his series of works
titled Nomos. In an Irish context (but not that of Eire)
mention should also be made of Howard Ferguson (born 1908),
the major Ulster composer of the 20th century. His small, neo-Romantic
output concentrated on chamber works, notably the Octet
op.4 (1933), but also includes the choral The Dream of the
Rood op.19 (1958-1959). He gave up composing in the early
1960s, feeling he had already said all he wanted to, and concentrated
on musicology.

In Eire there is a lively group of younger composers
centred on Dublin, but these have yet to be heard widely outside
Ireland; they include Roger Doyle (born 1949) whose works sometimes
reflect popular influences, and often use electronics. His output
includes stage works, notably The Love of Don Perlimplin
and Belisa in the Garden (1984, revised 1988), based on
Lorca, and he has produced one of the first scores for the new
technology of virtual reality (1992).

Sir Hamilton Harty is probably better remembered
as a conductor than a composer, though there has been a recent
revival of interest in his music. With Field (1782-1837), Balfe
(1808-1870) and Stanford he remains Ireland's most distinguished
composer. If (born in an age when all Ireland was still part
of the British Isles) much of his professional life was spent
in Britain, he retained a love of Irish folk-tradition. Irish
folk-elements lend a particular hue to his otherwise overtly
Romantic idiom, often derivative (from Tchaikovsky to Sibelius)
and usually traditionally tonal.

Most of Harty's music for orchestra, when not
actually quoting Irish material, has Irish legend as a programmatic
base. The best known is the tone-poem With the Wild Geese
(1910) - an Irish regiment who fought for the French in 1745
- which is a dramatic and sometimes marvellously stirring evocation
leading up to the battle itself. More familiar by name than
by performance, An Irish Symphony (1904, revised 1915
and 1924) is a compendium of themes based on Irish folk tunes,
with the combination of bright warmth and occasional Irish melancholy
that infects all his music. It is well crafted and attractive
if without depth, with some expansive moments, but deserves
its relative obscurity. The Violin Concerto in D minor
(1908) is entirely abstract. The first of many 20th-century
compositions especially written for the famous violinist Szigeti,
it is in the Romantic virtuoso tradition, sympathetic and with
singing, warm, but not especially memorable solo lines. The
slow movement is a poetic song, the soloist playing almost continuously.
The Variations on a Dublin Air (1912) for violin and
orchestra is in a similar vein. By far the most impressive of
these earlier works is the Ode to a Nightingale (1907)
for soprano and orchestra. The extended setting of Keats' poem
has something of the expressive ecstasy and wide ranging, high
solo line of similar late-Romantic vocal settings on continental
Europe, looking to Wagner and Mahler while influenced
by Elgar rather than Tchaikovsky. His gift for rich orchestration
is sharply focused in contrapuntal writing of considerable clarity.

Harty's conducting career limited composition
later in his life, but the handful of works include some of
his most appealing music. The Piano Concerto (1922) is
a virtuoso concerto in the tradition of Tchaikovsky and Rachmaninov
- Harty was himself a concert pianist and an accomplished accompanist.
The final movement includes the use of an Irish folk tune, and
for those looking for a lesser known concerto in the grand style
this has many moments of wallowing interest, especially in the
combination of grandeur and tongue-in-cheek effects in the final
pages, and with deft touches of orchestration, such as a bell
in the attractive slow movement. The opening of the short fantasy
for flute, harp and orchestra In Ireland (1935) has a
particularly Celtic flavour (heightened by the solo instruments),
rhapsodic melodic lines, and, with its subsequent Irish tunefulness,
is instantly appealing. A Wagnerian influence returns in the
opening of the tone poem The Children of Lir (1938) for
orchestra with wordless soprano solo. It is based on the Irish
legend of three children of Lir who were turned into swans for
a millennium before returning as ancient humans. In spite of
some atmospheric moments, sonorous orchestration, and a fine
ending, it ultimately lacks the memorability of a Sibelius
tone poem or the personal idiom of Bax, whose infusion
of Irish Celticism is far more interesting, and to whom readers
are advised to turn first.

Mention should also be made of Harty's arrangements
(staples of the English orchestral repertoire until eclipsed
by the movement for authenticity), notably of Handel's Water
Music, and A John Field Suite, orchestrations of
piano music by Field. Harty was principal conductor of the Hallé
Orchestra from 1920-1933, achieving an international reputation
for both himself and the orchestra, and was knighted in 1925.

───────────────────────────────────────

works include:

- An Irish Symphony

- piano concerto; violin concerto; fantasy In
Ireland for flute harp and orch.; Variations on a Dublin
Air for violin and orch.

- A Comedy Overture, The Children of
Lir and With the Wild Geese for orch.

- string trio; piano quartet

- Ode to a Nightingale for soprano and
orch.; many songs

───────────────────────────────────────

recommended works:

Ode to a Nightingale (1907) for soprano
and orchestra

fantasy In Ireland (1935) for flute harp
and orchestra

tone poem With the Wild Geese (1910)

───────────────────────────────────────

bibliography:

D.Greer (ed.) Hamilton Harty: his life and
music, Dublin

───────────────────────────────────────

STANFORD (Sir)
Charles Villiers

born 30th September 1852 at Dublin

died 29th March 1924 at London

───────────────────────────────────────

Charles Stanford and Hubert Parry were
the major figures in the revival of British music at the turn
of the century, and Stanford's role as the teacher of many of
the next generation of British composers is historically of
greater significance than his music. Stanford studied in Germany,
and his own music follows German late-Romantic models, notably
in his seven symphonies. Following his death, his works fell
into complete obscurity except for a handful of liturgical works,
still often encountered in Anglican churches. Recently there
has been a revival of interest in his music, both out of historical
curiosity and for his solid if uninspired technique. His work
remains entirely in the Romantic tradition, but with the twin
influences of Brahms and an element of Irish mysticism that
has assimilated Irish folk music and stories. For all their
craftsmanship these works lack an especially distinctive voice,
partly through the lack of any sense of inherent tension.

The Symphony No.3 `Irish' op.28 (1887)
is probably the best known of the symphonies, for its Irish
influence in the Brahmsian symphonic cast, and it was the work
that brought Stanford an international reputation. The scherzo
uses echoes of the jig, and the main theme of the slow movement,
often compared to the very similar theme from Brahms's fourth
symphony (premiered a year earlier), was actually from a collection
of Irish folksongs. Irish melodies are again used in the lively
and enjoyable finale. The subtitle of the Symphony No.5 L'Allegro
ed il Penseroso (1894) refers to Milton's two poems of the
same names; the score prints the poems, and movements correspond
to sections of those poems. With its vigorous and arresting
opening, and atmospheric sections in the slow movement, this
is a fine example of the well-constructed, if not especially
memorable, late-Romantic symphony. The Symphony No.6
(1905) was written to honour the memory of the artist George
Frederick Watts, who had died in 1904, and though without a
specific programme was influenced by various works by Watts;
a theme representing death returns in each of the four movements.
There is a vigour, too, to the opening of this work, with echoes
of Dvořák in its largely lyrical drive; the slow
movement opens with a limpid cor anglais tune, representing
love. The ideas of love and death vie at the close of the rather
long-winded symphony, with death overcoming in a calm close.

Of his concertante works, the unassuming and
Brahmsian Clarinet Concerto op.80 (1902) is still sometimes
heard, while the Piano Concerto No.2 op.126 (1911)
is completely under the spell of Rachmaninov's
second piano concerto (Stanford had conducted the British premiere
just before writing his own concerto), is unashamedly Romantic,
well constructed, and might interest those looking for piano
concertos in a similar vein to that of the Russian master. Of
his very large chamber output, the best is to be found in the
Clarinet Sonata op.139 (1911), with an Irish lament for
its second movement, and the Brahmsian Piano Trio No.1
op.35.

Although the Scotsman Alexander Mackenzie (1847-1935)
had written two Scottish Rhapsodies in the 1880s, it was Stanford
with his Irish Rhapsodies, the works that most reflect
his Irish heritage, who set the example for the many subsequent
British composers of a rhapsody based on British folk-musics.
The alternately boisterous and quietly beautiful Irish Rhapsody
No.1 op.78 (1902) is based on the heroic Irish legends of
Cuchullin, and uses two traditional Irish tunes, the first a
battle-song, the second the well-known Londonderry Air (its
Irish folk-song title is `Emer's Farewell to Cuchullin'); Stanford
provides an attractive and gentle setting for its appearance.
The Irish Rhapsody No.3 is for cello and orchestra, while
the colourful and expansive Irish Rhapsody No.4 op.141
(1913), subtitled `The fisherman of Loch Neagh and what he saw',
uses a traditional fisherman's song, as well as an Ulster marching
tune and the well-known `The Death of General Wolfe', but has
less concentrated effect than the first rhapsody. The Irish
Rhapsody No.6 is another concertante work, for violin and
orchestra.

Choral works occupy some fifty of Stanford's
177 opus numbers, but apart from his church services, most have
been largely forgotten. The vocal work most often revived is
the song-cycle Songs of the Sea op.91 (1904) for
bass and orchestra to verses by Sir Henry Newbolt, in style
a cross between the popular Victorian salon-song and the sea-shanty.
Its success led to a second set, Songs of the Fleet
op.117 (1910), of which the third song, `The Middle Watch',
is an effective piece of nocturnal tone-painting. An abiding
influence in his output was his church music, which set new
English standards, especially the often used Anglican service
known as `Stanford in B'. He was also concerned with reviving
English opera, but of his ten operas only Shamus O'Brien
(1895) achieved any success, and all are now forgotten.

Stanford taught at the Royal College of Music
from its inception in 1883 until 1924, and at Cambridge from
1887 to 1924. He was notorious for the conservatism of his tastes,
his most vitriolic distaste reserved for Debussy and
Strauss, whom he parodied in a choral work Ode
to Discord (1914). His many pupils included Bliss,
Bridge, Holst, Howells, Ireland,
Moeran and Vaughan Williams. He was active as
a conductor (notably of the London Bach Choir, 1885-1902), and
was knighted in 1902.

- clarinet concerto; 3 piano concertos; violin
concerto; Balata and Ballabile and Rondo for cello
and orch.; Concert Variations on an English Theme for
piano and orch.; Irish Concertino for violin, cello and
orch.

- Festival Overture, 6 Irish Rhapsodies
(No.3 for cello and orch., No.6 for violin and orch.), overture
Queen of the Seas, Oedipus Rex and other works
for orch.

- Fantasia and Toccata, Marcia Eroica,
sets of Sonata Britannica and Sonata Celtica and
other works for piano

- organ works

- song cycles Songs of the Fleet and Songs
of the Sea for bass and orch. and many other songs; oratorio
Eden; Biblical Songs for soloist and chorus; choral
ballad The Revenge; Six Elizabethan Pastorals
for chorus; much church music for chorus, notably Three Motets
op.38; Requiem and Stabat Mater for soloists,
chorus and orch.; many arrangements of folk-songs

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